THE STORY OF FERDINAND

Season: 56 (2001 - 2002)

Run Date(s): Sep. 28, 2001 - Oct. 7, 2001

Description: Book by James Sie; music by Douglas Wood; adapted from the childrenís book by Munro Leaf and Robert Lawson THE STORY OF FERDINAND is a musical adaptation of the tale of a young bull who prefers sitting quietly under a tree, just smelling the flowers, to jumping around, snorting, and butting heads with other bulls. This cow is no coward ñ he simply has his pacifist priorities clear. As Ferdinand grows big and strong, his temperament remains mellow, until the day he meets with the wrong end of a bee. In a show of bovine irony, the one day Ferdinand is most definitely not sitting quietly under the tree (due to a frightful sting), is the same day five men come to choose the "biggest, fastest, roughest bull" for the bullfights in Madrid. Ferdinand's day in the arena teaches a remarkable lesson in nonviolent tranquility. The story climbed to the top of the best seller list in 1938 and was the subject of an Oscar-winning Disney cartoon. This fun-filled musical entertains family audiences, while it subtly teaches its themes of peace and resistance to peer pressure ñ as relevant today as they were 66 years ago.